This is the blog of Naturetastic Photography by Sunny Wu. Come here and read about my photography trips and view my photos. If you want to visit my portfolio, just click the portfolio link below this box.

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Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Back in February 2016, I took at trip to Truckee, CA and Lake Tahoe (both California and Nevada side). Most of the photos are of snowy winter scenery. I visited places such as Donner Lake, Tahoe City, Kings Beach, Abandoned Historical Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnels, and more. I took many photos and are here to share with you. The photos will be split over several blog posts. If you have been following me on here, you'd know there has been a ton of stuff happening in my life such as my old computer breaking down and health issues I've had to deal with. This delayed my photo processing by a very long time which is why I am only posting them now. I also did vlogs on this trip. If you are interested in viewing them, you can do so here.

Full Resolution Photos: If you want to see full resolution photos of any of the photos you see here, use the following links. If you wish to purchase prints of any of the photos, please contact me here. To view my best Lake Tahoe and Truckee photos for 2012 and 2015, use this link. To see my best monochrome and abstract photos for 2016, use this link. To see all of my photos from this trip, use this link.

The photos for today are from day 3 of my trip and were taken on 2/21/2016. This will be the last of my photos from this trip. The photos for today are from Abandoned Historical Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnel #6, also know as Summit Tunnel, and tunnel #7. I shot these photos on my trip back through the tunnels. As mentioned in a previous blog post, there won't be any GPS location data for these photos as I was underground.

A photo of Central Pacific Railroad Tunnel #7 looking through to tunnel #6. As mentioned in a previous blog post, these tunnels are mainly known for the street art on the tunnel walls. Here is a photo of the street art on the walls of tunnel #7.

Black and white process of the photo above.

Street art on the walls of Central Pacific Railroad Tunnel #7.

Black and white process of the photo above.

Icicles on the walls in Central Pacific Railroad Tunnel #6 (aka Summit Tunnel). Photo shot with the help of my Canon Speedlite 600EX-RT.

Here is a photo shot from inside the tunnel #6 facing the entrance. I know I already did this photo earlier in the trip, but I felt I could maybe make a better composition so I shot another photo. I felt it made a pretty cool composition with the icicles and the contrast between light and dark.

Black and white process of the photo above.

A photo of the icicles at the entrance of tunnel #6 shot from the outside. As I have warned you in a previous blog post, please don't stand under these icicles unless you are willing to take the risk of dying! These icicles are constantly falling down and if one fell on you, it will definitely injure or kill you. As a nature photographer, I decided to take a risk. I positioned myself under a few icicles that looked more sturdy and well formed. I also had someone watching the whole time for potential danger too.

Black and white process of the photo above.

A photo of the entrance to Central Pacific Railroad Tunnel #6 (aka Summit Tunnel). You can see how large those icicles are compared to the people inside the tunnel. As I mentioned before, they are huge and potentially dangerous.

Black and white process of the photo above.

This is all the photos for today and for this chain of blog posts. I hope you have enjoyed the photos! Please don't forget to share with your friends and family members! Also, if you want to get notifications when I post up more photos, "Like" us on Facebookor follow me on Twitter and Google+. These links can also be found on the top of the right sidebar.

Monday, May 30, 2016

Back in February 2016, I took at trip to Truckee, CA and Lake Tahoe (both California and Nevada side). Most of the photos are of snowy winter scenery. I visited places such as Donner Lake, Tahoe City, Kings Beach, Abandoned Historical Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnels, and more. I took many photos and are here to share with you. The photos will be split over several blog posts. If you have been following me on here, you'd know there has been a ton of stuff happening in my life such as my old computer breaking down and health issues I've had to deal with. This delayed my photo processing by a very long time which is why I am only posting them now. I also did vlogs on this trip. If you are interested in viewing them, you can do so here.

Full Resolution Photos: If you want to see full resolution photos of any of the photos you see here, use the following links. If you wish to purchase prints of any of the photos, please contact me here. To view my best Lake Tahoe and Truckee photos for 2012 and 2015, use this link. To see my best monochrome and abstract photos for 2016, use this link. To see all of my photos from this trip, use this link.

The photos for today are from day 3 of my trip and were taken on 2/21/2016. The photos for today are from Donner Pass, China Wall, and Abandoned Historical Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnel #7 and #8. It is located at Donner Pass in Truckee, CA. This and the rest of the blog posts will feature photos from these abandoned railroad tunnels.

A winter scenery photo from Donner Pass shot between Central Pacific Railroad Tunnels #6 and #7. In the photo, you can see Donner Pass Road and Donner Summit Bridge which was where I was at in one of the previous blog posts.

Another photo of Central Pacific Railroad Tunnel #7 shot between tunnels #6 and #7. Right through the tunnel, you can see China Wall. This photo was shot in the same position as the photo above.

Black and white process of the photo above.

A photo of China Wall and Central Pacific Railroad Tunnel #8. Due to the time constraints that day, I didn't head into tunnel #8. China Wall is the wall in front of tunnel #8 on the right. The wall is called China Wall because Chinese workers constructed the wall along with most of the Central Pacific Railroad system.

A winter scenery photo from Donner Pass shot between Central Pacific Railroad Tunnels #7 and #8. In the photo, you can see Donner Pass Road and Donner Summit Bridge which was where I was at in one of the previous blog posts.

Black and white process of the photo above.

Another winter scenery photo from Donner Pass shot between Central Pacific Railroad Tunnels #7 and #8. In the photo, you can see Donner Pass Road and Donner Summit Bridge which was where I was at in one of the previous blog posts. This photo was shot in the same position as the photo above.

A photo of the underpass on Old Donner Summit Road. Right behind the tree near the center is China Wall. I didn't even know this was an underpass when I took the photo, but the 4:20 graffiti cracked me up and I thought it would be funny to take a photo of it.

This is all the photos for today! I hope you have enjoyed the photos! In the next blog post I will post the rest of my photos from my trip back through the Abandoned Historical Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnels. Please don't forget to share with your friends and family members! Also, if you want to get notifications when I post up more photos, "Like" us on Facebookor follow me on Twitter and Google+. These links can also be found on the top of the right sidebar.

Sunday, May 29, 2016

Back in February 2016, I took at trip to Truckee, CA and Lake Tahoe (both California and Nevada side). Most of the photos are of snowy winter scenery. I visited places such as Donner Lake, Tahoe City, Kings Beach, Abandoned Historical Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnels, and more. I took many photos and are here to share with you. The photos will be split over several blog posts. If you have been following me on here, you'd know there has been a ton of stuff happening in my life such as my old computer breaking down and health issues I've had to deal with. This delayed my photo processing by a very long time which is why I am only posting them now. I also did vlogs on this trip. If you are interested in viewing them, you can do so here.

Full Resolution Photos: If you want to see full resolution photos of any of the photos you see here, use the following links. If you wish to purchase prints of any of the photos, please contact me here. To view my best Lake Tahoe and Truckee photos for 2012 and 2015, use this link. To see my best monochrome and abstract photos for 2016, use this link. To see all of my photos from this trip, use this link.

The photos for today are from day 3 of my trip and were taken on 2/21/2016. The photos for today are from the Abandoned Historical Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnel #6, also known as Summit Tunnel. It is located at Donner Pass in Truckee, CA. This and the rest of the blog posts will feature photos from these abandoned railroad tunnels.

There won't be any GPS location data for these photos as I was underground. Also, almost all of the photos shot inside the tunnels were long exposures done with a Canon Speedlite 600EX-RTand a Nitecore TM16 Flashlight. There is little light inside the tunnels. If you plan on visiting, please make sure you bring a good flashlight. You will also see later in the blog post that during winter, the ground is covered in ice and there are icicles on the ceiling of the tunnels. The ice is very slippery. Expect to slip, fall, and take a very long time to navigate the tunnel. It took me 1.5 hours to navigate through tunnel #6 (including time spent taking photos). I almost slipped and fell many times, but my camera tripod has spiked feet which dug into the ice to break my fall. My mom also helped with navigating through the tunnels. I recommend you bring a friend in case of falls and injuries. There is no cellphone service in the tunnels. Even with the help of my camera tripod and my mom, I still fell on my butt once. Now that I've covered the ice on the ground during winter, lets move onto icicle safety during winter. The icicles will fall from the ceiling (and you will get to see this in my blog post later). To help prevent this, please don't shout in the tunnels and don't talk too loud. If you are navigating the tunnels during winter, use your flashlight to check for icicles above your head. Don't walk under them unless you absolutely have to. It can potentially kill you. Again, as I have recommended earlier, bring a friend, especially when visiting during the winter.

Message From the Photographer: Above I have mentioned to you that I have used the help of my trusty Nitecore TM16 Flashlight in some of these tunnel photos I have done. The flashlight is a 4000 lumen flashlight is is very very bright. If you are a night photographer, cave photographer, or a photographer that does any photography in low light situations, I highly recommend you get one of these flashlights. It is very strong and puts out a great amount of light. In my own opinion, it practically turns night into day. It is great for night time exploration, cave exploration, and also great for low light photography and light painting. If you want to see a demo, you can watch my railroad tunnel vlog from this trip here or my flashlight demo here.

A photo of the entrance into Central Pacific Railroad Tunnel #6 (aka Summit Tunnel). The entrance is right across the street from Donner Ski Ranch. As you can see, there are massive icicles in the cave. That is why I was warning you in the intro about the potential dangers of traveling in the tunnels during winter. Being a photographer, I wanted to take photos of the giant icicles, so I decided to take the risk.

Here is a photo shot from inside the tunnel facing the entrance. The first thing I thought was it looked like an entrance into a snow monster lair. I felt it made a pretty cool composition with the icicles and the contrast between light and dark. See how big the icicles were compared to the people at the entrance? The icicles at the entrance were huge!

Black and white process of the photo above.

A long exposure from inside the railroad tunnel. This was still pretty close to the entrance so the ground was still covered with plenty of snow that was probably blown in by wind. This area was not too hard to walk on, but still had quite some slippery parts covered in ice. Please be careful if you visit during winter. Also, the biggest icicles were at the entrance, but there were still quite some big icicles in the cave itself. Don't let the size in the photo fool you. If they fall on your head, you will be killed.

Black and white process of the photo above.

Here is a close up shot of a fallen icicle inside the tunnel. It was huge. I know it might seem small on the photo, but it really wasn't. I attempted to push it over and move it but ended up failing. It is a huge chunk of ice and is very heavy. I'm guessing something about a quarter size of this block falling on you would be enough to knock you out. If you were under this icicle when it fell down, it would have crushed you to death.

Black and white process of the photo above.

Here is a long exposure further into the railroad tunnel. As you can see, the ground here is now covered entirely by ice. Those chunks of ice you see on the ground are fallen icicles. They were very big. Even walking through the tunnel, I still heard icicles falling now and then. It was scary as the icicles falling made a pretty loud boom every time, but I enjoy taking some risks for photography. As long as you are frequently checking for icicles on the ceiling with a flashlight as you navigate through, you should be relatively safe.

Black and white process of the photo above.

At the other end of the tunnel is the main attraction for Summit Tunnel. At the end of tunnel #6 is a bunch of street art on the walls. Tourists come into the tunnel to look at the street art on the walls. They were quite interesting. The ground here was still covered in a layer of ice and was very difficult to walk on.

Black and white process of the photo above.

A photo of the street art on the walls in Summit Tunnel.

A photo of the street art on the walls in Summit Tunnel.

A photo of the street art on the walls in Summit Tunnel.

Black and white process of the photo above.

One more photo of the street art on the walls and the railroad tunnel.

Black and white process of the photo above.

This is all the photos for today! I hope you have enjoyed the photos! In the next blog post I will continue with more photos from another few tunnels and scenery from Donner Pass. Please don't forget to share with your friends and family members! Also, if you want to get notifications when I post up more photos, "Like" us on Facebookor follow me on Twitter and Google+. These links can also be found on the top of the right sidebar.

Tuesday, May 24, 2016

Back in February 2016, I took at trip to Truckee, CA and Lake Tahoe (both California and Nevada side). Most of the photos are of snowy winter scenery. I visited places such as Donner Lake, Tahoe City, Kings Beach, Abandoned Historical Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnels, and more. I took many photos and are here to share with you. The photos will be split over several blog posts. If you have been following me on here, you'd know there has been a ton of stuff happening in my life such as my old computer breaking down and health issues I've had to deal with. This delayed my photo processing by a very long time which is why I am only posting them now. I also did vlogs on this trip. If you are interested in viewing them, you can do so here.

Full Resolution Photos: If you want to see full resolution photos of any of the photos you see here, use the following links. If you wish to purchase prints of any of the photos, please contact me here. To view my best Lake Tahoe and Truckee photos for 2012 and 2015, use this link. To see my best monochrome and abstract photos for 2016, use this link. To see all of my photos from this trip, use this link.

Today I begin my photos from day 3 of my trip and were taken on 2/21/2016. The photos for today are from the vista point at Donner Summit Bridge, scenery near Donner Summit Bridge, and Donner Summit Bridge itself.

Message From the Photographer: Hi guys, do you love the photos on my blog? If you do, there is a way you can help support my photography. I am not asking for donations, but there is a way you can easily help me! Do you shop on Amazon? Please bookmark my link and use it when you shop on Amazon. I participate in the Amazon Associates Program, so Amazon will pay me a small commission for every sale I generate through my link. This won't cost you anything extra and the funds go into funding my photography and my videos. Also, you can help me by disabling any Adblockers you have on my website. I have Amazon ads on my blog posts, and those also help with with funding. Thank you guys for reading and as always you can share my photos and blog posts out to your friends and family members as a way to support me. Thank you for your support, I really appreciate it.

A panorama from Donner Summit Bridge Vista Point. Slightly to the left from the center is Donner Lake. On the mountain side on the right is the Historical Abandoned Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnels.

Another scenery photo from Donner Summit Bridge Vista Point shot in the same spot. In the center is Donner Lake. On the mountain side on the right is the Historical Abandoned Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnels.

Black and white process of the photo above.

I walked across the road from the vista point and got a photo of the mountain.

I then hiked down to get under Donner Summit Bridge. I saw a few people sledding down there so I guessed it was relatively safe. The hike was not easy. I slipped and fell on my butt several times. Thanks to my years of photography, I have pretty much trained myself to instinctively elevate the camera when I fall so it doesn't hit anything. My tripod and I got pretty wet, but my camera stayed dry. Here is a photo of the bridge.

This is all the photos for today! I hope you have enjoyed the photos! In the next blog post I will start my photos from the Abandoned Historical Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnels. Please don't forget to share with your friends and family members! Also, if you want to get notifications when I post up more photos, "Like" us on Facebookor follow me on Twitter and Google+. These links can also be found on the top of the right sidebar.